Russia's new stealth fighter jet made its public debut Tuesday, according to state-run news source RIA Novosti.
The Sukhoi T-50, developed collaboratively by Russia and India, appeared at the MAKS 2011 air show in Zhukovsky, outside Moscow.
Gen. Alexander Zelin, head of the Russian air force, told RIA Novosti he expects the T-50 prototype to be ready in 2013, with "mass-produced aircraft" arriving in 2014 or 2015.
The aircraft is expected to become a staple of airborne defense for both Russia and India, Mikhail Pogosyan, head of Russia's United Aircraft Corp., told RIA Novosti.
"The T-50 will be the newest main plane both for the Russian and the Indian air force," Pogosyan said.
The article from the state-run media source says the Sukhoi T-50 cost the two governments about $6 billion to develop, with India shouldering about 35% of the cost. It is intended to match the U.S. F-22 raptor.
The F-22 is 15 years old. What do you think the Americans have flying around right now, that we don't know about. It would make the T-50 look like a paper airplane.
This plane doesn't look stealth at all. The engine outlets look like they will give off one hell of a heat signature. It also seems that there's no internal weapons storage so the weapons on the outside would show up on radar. Seems that it looks like a stealth fighter but isn't very stealth at all.
I'm sleeping? I do not think in this century will continue to invent the same type of plane, it's time to teach anti-gravity aircraft
Catching up is hard to do..... The Pilot for this Comunist Plane is a half Indian / Half Ruso
Proof that the U.S. private sector will sell any U.S technology to the highest bidder...wait, make that anybody if they can make a sale to bolster their bottom line.
I can't believe a country like Russia with a crappy economy and standard of living would spend money on something like this
Critical Thinker: I though all military industry was private industry. What's your point? Nationalize plane makers and keep our secrets, for the private sector doesn't care?? Where exactly the "thinker" part of your name fits into this?
Did you ever think that the technology might have been stolen, clownshoes?
Why not, look at what we spent to keep GM going.... As far as the technology, it was billy boy himself who allowed us to give the chinese our guidance systems for the 'space' program that just happened to trickle down to other places.
this plane is rivaling F-22 technology, decades behind, when the F-35 rolled out it made F-22 technology sort of obsolete, so no problem with russia (which is not an enemy ATM) having similar technology when we are a generation ahead.
let them have their little toy ( which by the way is an obvious rip off ) America is moving forward in military technology and investing in unmanned crafts. The war of technology......the industrial age is far behind us.
Soon enough we will even see robot soldiers in the near future.
Wow, why is it when people see nothing but a picture of a plane like this, their first thoughts are of how it might fare against something like a F-22, and all the sudden they can't think of anything else and thus the mission of the T-50 OBVIOUSLY must be to win dogfights against American pilots flying F-22's, F-15's, and F-18's.
Has it ever occurred to anyone that another country out there might have some perceived need for a military plane that has absolutely nothing to do with killing American pilots and nothing to do with the United States of America whatsoever?
It is your question that was not normal. The comparison in the article was perfectly normal. Race horses are bred to race (mainly), so if you mention a potentially best race horse, it will be compared to another best race horse. Fighter planes are built to fight/kill other fighter planes, so again, the best are compared. Not thinking this way is abnormal. Good or bad is another debate altogether.
You are right. It is designed to kill Pakistani Thunder, F16s (Pakis) and the Chinese stealth fighter in development.
The thing is that very few people seem to be asking what India might do with such a plane, as if Pakistan's air force isn't even a concern and the mission of the T-50 might not be to compete with American F-15's but to dominate Pakistan's F-16's.
Is this plane obsolete? Well if it's mission is to dominate the PAF's F-16's, then most-certainly it is not. If it's mission is to survive a military encounter with the best of the United States Air Force or Navy, then yes, probably.
Common sense says to build weapons systems to compete against the superpowers. If you're the US, you tend to build to confront Russian equipment, as it's the most common equipment around.
If you are Russian, you build to fight US equipment and weapons, as those are the most likely adversary for you and your clients, should it come to military action.
One is most certainly NOT going to build a fighter to engage British fighters or Somali fighters. 🙂
It's a good knockoff. Sure it 's not made in China?
Russia was stealing US technology LONG before China even HAD any 20th century technologies.
Russia's atomic and hydrogen bombs: Copies of US models stolen by KGB spies.
Russia even build a space shuttle, but couldn't afford to launch it. A copy of the US space shuttle.
Dozens of other technologies copied, to include computers.
So, ancient news.
That said, IS it a copy? Or is implementation of certain technologies always going to tend to look quite similar for a particular capability envelope?
Does it have Louis Vuitton logos on the seats?
evilphoton, if you are talking about increasing the size of government the answer is no, if you are talking about spending more the answer is no, however, if you are talking about life, liberty and the persuit of happiness the answer is republican – force me to do something and you have adversley effected my freedom.
I make parts for the F-22 and nothing can compare to it. NOTHING.
Just because you don't know about it doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
True. Just because it looks like a Raptor, deosn;t mean it has all the materials, avionics, and capabilities of a Raptor. Rusting MIG knockoffs of American planes are legendary.
"Just because you don't know about it doesn't mean it doesn't exist."
Yeah, like Bigfoot, the Loch Ness monster, and the fire breathing dragon in my garage.
This plane has impressive specs and will hold it's own in a dogfight. It is fast and maneuverable. It has full 3D thrust vectoring along all three axes, pitch, yaw and roll. In a capable pilots hands this will be a monster.
yaw pitch and roll are not axes ... but rotations around the principal axes ...
So what? Let's hear what kind of armaments it carries.
One word "DRONES"
Rival the F-22? it looks exactly like it!!
Still has the old Soviet engines (i.e. no vectored thrust). Avonics and flight control system are 30 yrs behind current US technology. No match for the F-22–Just another piece of crap.
Unmanned aircraft will be able to out-fly maned aircraft on a scale never before seen. The human body can only cope with so much punishment, which means the F22 is literally pushing the envelope of what the human body can endure. The F22's weakest link is the person flying it, as it is capable of much more than the computer will allow it to do. UAV fighter plans are the wave of the future, and we are way ahead on their development as well. Russia's new plane is nearly 15 years too late.
I totally agree with that